Cross-dressing to Backbeats: An Exploration of the Practices, Wo/men Producers, and History of Electroclash

• Main Author: Madden, David
• Format: Others
• Published: 2013
• Online Access: http://spectrum.library.concordia.ca/977861/1/Madden_PhD_F2013.pdf; Madden, David <http://spectrum.library.concordia.ca/view/creators/Madden=3ADavid=3A=3A.html> (2013) Cross-dressing to Backbeats: An Exploration of the Practices, Wo/men Producers, and History of Electroclash. PhD thesis, Concordia University.

This research-creation dissertation focuses on the emergence of electroclash as a dominant form of electronic dance music in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Electroclash combines the extended pulsing sections of techno, house and other dance musics with the trashier energy of rock and new wave. The genre signals an attempt to reinvigorate dance music with a sense of sexuality, personality and irony. Electroclash also emphasizes, rather than hides, the European, trashy elements of electronic dance music. This project addresses the following questions: what is distinct about the genre and its related practices, both in and out of the studio? Why do rock and electro come together at this point and in this way? Why is electroclash affectively powerful for musicians, audiences and listeners? And, what does the genre portend in terms of our understandings of the politics of electronic music? The coming together of rock and electro is examined vis-à-vis the ongoing changing sociality of music production/distribution and the changing role of the producer. Numerous women, whether as solo producers or in the context of collaborative groups, significantly contributed to shaping the aesthetics and production practices of electroclash, an anomaly in the history of popular music and electronic music where the role of the producer has typically been associated with men. These changes are discussed in relation to the way key electroclash producers often used a hybrid approach to production involving the integration of new(er) technologies, such as laptops containing various audio production software with older, inexpensive keyboards, microphones, samplers and drum machines to achieve the ironic backbeat laden hybrid electro-rock sound.